Lyria
by laiaf
Summary: AU - Warning: The story is placed at the same timing as Soneas' but Sonea doesn't exist, the protagonist is Lyria, a girl with the same age as Sonea but with a very differnt story. She loves adventures, nature and magic. Akkarin will have a lot of momments as well and probably some chapters from his POV. There will be adventures, drama and love, a little bit of everything!
1. Prologue

**A/N – This is my first fanfic and English is not my mother tongue so any comments regarding both content and grammar/vocabulary are very welcomed (and if someone wants to be my beta send me a pm =) ). My first idea was to write an alternative ending of the TBM but there is a lot of them and I don't have any new idea, so I started to thing a new story in the TBM world. I warn you that there will be no Sonea but this will be an alternative story that take place pretty much the same time. I hope you like it.**

_Disclaimer – TBM world belongs to Trudi Canavan. I just try to do something enjoyable with it._

**PROLOGUE**

The Healers have already told them that they don't have any cure for this disease. Many people around Imardin was slowly dying, even some magicians if the rumours were true. Elia felt weaker every day and she knew that she was not going to live much longer, but she needed to be strong, to fight against this hated illness. Not for herself but for the child that was growing inside of her belly.

The day when she realized that she was pregnant she persuaded Victor, her husband, to go to see the Healers to make sure that everything was going fine. It was quite a victory because Victor didn't like magicians although he never told her any reason for such antipathy. That day changed everything. The nice young woman who attended her quickly said that the child was perfectly fine and growing fast, but then she frowned slightly and when she excused herself to go to look for another Healer they were full of anxiety. After a few minutes, an older woman wearing the same green robes appeared and presented herself as Lady Vinara, she took Elia's hand and close her eyes for a few seconds. When Lady Vinara opened her eyes flashes of resignation and sadness crossed her face before placing again her reassuring healer mask.

"I'm very sorry Lady Elia… there is no easy way to say this… you are infected with the Sleeping Death". Elia was in shock, she didn't even realize that Victor was shouting to the women that they must heal her, that he was sure that there was something they can do with their damn magic. She knew perfectly well that there was any hope, the Queen herself was slowly dying of the Sleeping Death. People started to give it this name because there is no warning sign nor a symptom to let you know if you are infected, just a progressive fatigue and one day you no longer awake. So she made Victor close his mouth with an authoritarian hand movement and asked for the baby, the Healers said that they don't have any pregnant patient but that she probably will die before the baby was ready to be born.

But Elia could not accept that, she could not let her child die without even the possibility to live. So she fought, she had been fighting every day for the last twenty weeks against the exhaustion and the sleepiness. Fearing every night that would be the last, but every morning waking up with all her will to give her child a chance to live. But it was hard, very hard, and Victor attitude didn't help at all; during every day of the first cycle of the Eye he was constantly muttering that the child was taking her strength and that she must abort. She tried to pretend to not listen when he said those things but one day she felt that it was just too much. "I'm going to die Victor. I'm going to die and the sooner you accept it the better for everyone. The last thing that I want to do in this world is to hold _my_ baby in _my_ arms. So I don't want to listen your stupid murmurs anymore." And she certainly didn't since he stopped to talk to her. She knew that he was in denial and that he was angry with her because she had accepted her fate, but knowing his reasons didn't make it easier to forgive his childish attitude and his lack of support.

* * *

When Elia woke up she barely had the strength to open her eyes, she knew that her end was close, too close, too soon. She could listen Victor's deep breath next to her, warming her right ear. She used it to relax herself while she was trying to count the weeks. _It is too soon, it is just the thirty second week, I have to continue fighting_. But she knew that she couldn't push her life any longer. "Victor, it's time". It was only a whisper, whispers were all she could do at that point, but it was full of authority and serenity and it was all that was needed to wake Victor suddenly up. "Elia, what is going on? You are all right, aren't you?" the fear slid between words as thick smoke while his face was a portrait of anguish. "Call the Healers, Victor".

No one expected that Elia was going to survive the birth, but when the Healers let Victor enter to the chamber there she was, holding a very little, crumpled, almost red thing between her skeletal arms. She was looking to the baby with eyes full of pride and joy and when she heard Victor asking how was she, she looked up with a warm happy smile. "She is strong, she is going to live. Don't hate her Victor, it is not her fault." She answer although she knew that he wasn't asking for the baby and her gaze changed to that one she wear every time she explain him how wrong was he about something. "I'll take care of her Elia, I promise. But don't abandon me, not so soon, I'm not ready yet…" He was begging with all the fear and love of his soul while filling his eyes with tears. "You would never be." She knew him too well, he was always afraid of the things he didn't understand or could not predict. And with a tired smile but with love in her eyes she looked to her baby one more time and whispered _Lyria _before closing her eyes one last time. He stayed there crying in her shoulder while murmuring words in her ear, words that no one heard. A Healer took the little baby that seemed to be in a sleep as deep as that of her mother so at least she could live.


	2. Chapter 1 - Unexpected Meetings

**A/N – I hope that my English is not very bad, I try my best. Akkarin will make his first appearance on this story, enjoy it! :)**

_Disclaimer – BMT belongs to Trudi Canavan. I'm just trying to do something enjoyable with it._

**Vocabulary **

**Ritel: Little bird, usually entirely black, which does a sound like hand bells and eats grains and small insects. **

**Whitebell: Little white flowers bell-shaped, they usually grow in the shadows of the acacias. **

**CHAPTER 1 – UNEXPECTED MEETINGS**

Lyria was bored, she always was when she was enforced to stay home with Naty, her nanny. Truth is the woman wasn't very funny, she never have been it and, now, with sixty years in her shoulders, she had little energy to play with a seven years old girl. Mr. David, Lyria's tutor who teaches her everything that a lady of the Houses may need, had warned them that he was coming an hour later than usual to do their two hour lesson. So there she was, sitting on the library's floor, skimming an adventures book and looking out the window at birds flying. It wasn't that the book was bad, it was actually one of her favourites, a guy running adventures around the world that became a hero. But she couldn't focus on the story because she had already read it a thousand times. All she wanted was to go to the Guild's forest and climb the old giant oak tree where the Ritel couple had the nest with three eggs about to hatch. She couldn't believe that she can be so unlucky. _Why had David to come late precisely today?_ thought could sneak Naty, that was not difficult, but if she wasn't there when Mr. David came then her father would be furious._ I hope that at least Tiara can get there on time to see them hatch and tell me everything later! _

Tiara was one of her two true friends. She was one year younger than Lyria but they couldn't recall when they met each other, Tiara's mother had worked as cooker at Lyria's house and the girls had spent whole days together until Victor chase them out for no apparent reason one year ago. Lyria had been crying and yelling to his father why had he done it, but he just lock her up in her room. Their relationship has never been good, basically she only saw him at dinner time and most days they didn't address a single word. In the few times that their eyes met Lyria could see a mixture of sadness and anger, which makes her think that she had done something bad, although she never knew what was it. The only thing she liked about her father was the books that he gave her every birthday. Thus she tried to see him the minimum possible and she fly out of home whenever she had a chance, that way there was less possibilities of doing something that may make him angry.

Lyria read her adventure books to Tiara until she decided that it would be better to teach her how to read and write, after that they started to invent their own adventure stories. They took advantage of every opportunity that came their way to live some adventure, so they had investigated the Guild's forest and gardens and, more recently, they had started to explore the Slums' regions closest to the Inner Wall. Just the zones near Tiara's new place, a room she and her mother were to live after the guards and magicians kick them out the Inner Circle during the last Purge. Lyria never understood why did they should kick them out, they were good people and everyone said that the bad people lived in the Slums. But the guys Tiara presented to her seemed nice, _maybe it depends on the Slums zone_, she concluded. She gave Tiara some old clothes so she could pass the doors of the Inner Wall without problems with the Guard and she also took some old servants clothes for herself which she fouled and broke a little in order to pass unnoticed when she went to play with new Tiara's friends. They were nice with her, they treated her well, but sometimes she can see some of them look at her frowning. She knew that they didn't trust her, after all she was too well educated and nourished to be in the Slums.

Some days her nanny took her to play at some neighbour's house. She knew them all although she never succeed in finding someone whom she could feel a connection. She thought than the majority of them were too spoiled, thinking all day with new toys or dresses, or even worse, the older girls were talking all day about how much pretty was Mr Perfect and how much they wanted to marry him. None of them was interested in going to the woods nor, in her opinion, in doing anything remotely exiting. She supposed that they thought that she was a freak and she learned, after some telling off and laughs at her expense, that telling what she thought about their hobbies didn't give her any good. So she went there pretending that trying on fifty dresses in an afternoon was the funnier thing in the world, though she hadn't yet achieved a good performance when the girls started to talk about pretty boys, so every time the subject came she went to the yard or the window where Sky appeared in a moment if she whistled the right melody.

Because the truth was that Sky and Lyria were inseparables. She founded his egg in a nest that had fallen after an unusually strong storm two years before. The egg was cracked but she took it and hide it next to the fireplace of her bedroom, she covered it with blankets and felt sleep in the floor while stroking it. At the end the egg hatch and a small handful of white feather appeared which made an almost inaudible little noise. Tiara and Lyria spend a lot of days searching and catching all types of bugs, grains, herbs and worms to feed him, after numerous attempts they found out that he liked flowers the most, especially the whitebells. Day by day Sky grow up until he was as big as Lyria's head, his voice became capable of performing intricate melodies and the white down gave way to long blue feathers which made Lyria think about the colour of the sky after a strong summer storm. In every occasion Lyria and Tiara took Sky to the forest so he could fly freely and, one day when he was grown enough, Lyria tried to explain him that he must stay in the forest to live there and she ran back home after he flew above the trees. But when she went back to her room after dinner she found him beating her window with his peak, since then he was her best friend and she was all his world. Thus Sky became her confidant, Lyria told him every adventure of her books, her deepest dreams and what she thought about the other kids and her father. She trained him with melodies that she whistled and then he repeated, with just few weeks they had melodies for saying 'stay here', 'come with me', 'let's go to make a race', 'let's spin' and 'it's sleeping time'. But the thing that Lyria wanted the most was being able to fly with Sky above houses and trees, she envied how he could do sharp bends with a soft movement, how he dived to hunt and how he danced with the wind. Thus in absence of wings, she took her sandals off and ran through the woods with grass, dust or snow under her feet and a blue flash around. Then she went to clean herself in a spring she found in a corner of the forest, her father wasn't happy when she filled the house with mud.

* * *

Lyria was running as fast as she could and Sky was following her with a frantic flapping. After eating the lunch she snaked Naty and she ran to the forest where Tiara was waiting. But she expended too much time watching the recently born Ritels and now she was late to dinner. She was turning the corners like a ray until, when only three blocks and one corner and a halt left, she saw a dark red flash and she snapped back, hitting with dirty dust pavers.

When she opened the eyes, her elbows and palms were burning, scratched and dirty. _Perfect, I will arrive late and with the clothes ruined, _she thought. But then she heard a grave and worried voice that said "I'm sorry baby, are you ok?" And when she looked up she saw a young man with black bob dishevelled hair, white face and the darkest eyes she'd never seen. Those eyes were as black as a night without moon nor stars, but the cold she expected to found was replaced by a warm and kind look that made her smile. She tried to stand up but groaned as her hands touched the ground.

"You are injured! Let me see that." The young man exclaimed as he was taking one of her little hands with firm and long fingers. Then he closed his eyes and Lyria started to feel the injured zones itching and warming. When she looked to it she saw that their arms were perfectly well and a little pink tone in the repaired zones. _He had healed me… he is a Magician!_ And a strike of excitement ran through her little body. She had observed the magicians from the top of the trees and she had sawn some of the marvellous things that they could do. Looking into her palms one more time she rose from the floor, dusted herself off and looked to the boy carefully. She recognized the red Warrior robe and, feeling the attraction of those eyes, she looked straight to them to thank him with a big smile. And suddenly she remembered her modals lessons and flushed before doing her best bow and adding a "my Lord" She wasn't used to see magicians so closely and most unused to talk with them, her father didn't appreciate their company so she never saw one in the house.

"There is no need for you to call me that, you make me feel old!" the young man said with half smile. "You call me Akkarin. And who is this one?" He added while his eyebrows were climbing and he pointed to Sky, who had landed on Lyria's shoulder as soon as she was straight. "Oh, this is Sky, my best friend" Lyria answered relaxing herself and doing a big smile again looking and stroking Sky's head. "That's what I thought. You are very lucky, I've never had a bird friend" He was doing his half smile once again. "But you are a Magician, there is no luck greater than this one!" This time he left a huge laugh.

He told her that he will take her home to explain their parents about her clothes so they wouldn't punish her. That seemed perfect to Lyria, she knew that her father wouldn't be happy with her appearing with a Magician in his door, but for the moment she only wanted to spend more time with that wonderful Magician, and maybe the excuse would work out for being late as well. So while they went to her house, she used the occasion to ask him about the Warriors duties, because the only thing she had been able to see is that there was a lot of them using a lot that strange circular building of the university. And he told her about some things the Warriors usually do and that he was going to leave the next day to search ancestral magic in every corner of the world. Lyria's eyes were shining with fascination and envy and she thought, not for the first time, that being a Magician will allow her to fulfil all her dreams.

"When I'm grown up I will also go to see world seeking for adventures" She shout while she was spinning at great velocity with her arms opened, her eyes closed and thousands of images inside her little head. "You are a very brave girl" Akkarin said while laughing slightly. "But you will have to be careful, world is very dangerous for running through it alone." He added with a mysterious note in his voice. "So who is going with you?" In that moment Lyria stopped to spin and looked directly into his eyes with palpable curiosity. "I'm going alone, but I'm one of the most powerful magicians of the Guild, nothing can happen to me." Akkarin was smiling and doing a pleased pose. Lyria's eyes were about to explode with so much fascination and admiration, it was like knowing a character of her novels.

They were almost in front of her house door, but before he could knock, Lyria turned right to look him into the eyes and she let scape the question which contained all the deepest hope of her heart. "Do you think that I could be a Magician?" Her voice reflected her fear of knowing that she hadn't a chance. She was half expecting it, after all, she didn't know that any of her familiars had any magic. "Let's take a look, give me a moment." Akkarin gave her an encouraging smile before closing his eyes and placing his long fingers in both sides of her head. After few moments he retired them and looked Lyria with the eyebrows slightly up. "Yes, there's no doubt you could be a great Magician." And he stroked her cheek before knocking the door.

Lyria stayed there with her eyes full opened and shining of emotion. Not even her father row about talking with a Magician made any effect on it and she was still wearing it when she finally was laying in her bed to sleep. But of course she couldn't sleep, she was too focused in a single idea. She had magic, her dreams may come true. Now she just need to convince her father to let her join the Guild. It wasn't going to be easy, but she never surrender.

"Have you heard it Sky? I have magic! Now we just have to think a plan to persuade father." She murmured to the bird that was sleeping on the top of the hall-stand that was placed next to her pillow. That was the first night that she tried to find the magic inside of her body, she closed the eyes and she tried to look into her brain, searching a light or something, anything. But the only thing she got was a hard headache.

* * *

Akkarin was walking with big steps, Lorlen was waiting him to do a farewell and drink something and he was already late. His mother had been saying him a thousand times how stupid and useless was his idea of doing a book of ancestral magic, reminding him the uncountable appointments she had already scheduled with woman worthy of marriage and that Merin was going to be king very soon and he could not throw their friendship between them.

So he was distracted thinking about how much he wanted to get rid of his mother and all those appointments, that he only saw a golden flash before noticing something bumping against him. Then he saw a little girl on the ground and a blue bird landing on her chest and touching her nose delicately while singing a single slow high note, he seemed worried. The girl had very blonde hair, between gold and silver, she was a little bit sun-burnt, but it was clear that her skin was very white. _Maybe she's from Elyne_. He thought before approaching her and sloping to help her_. _In that moment the girl opened the eyes, big eyes so blue as blue as her bird, with a face of not knowing what had happened. He was in rush, but he couldn't let that little girl like that, so he healed her, he accompanied her to her home and he ran to find Lorlen.

"Sorry for being late, my friend. My mother and a little bird delayed me" He greeted Lorlen with a smack on his shoulder and a big smile. "Don't you have better excuses for being late to our farewell? How exactly can a little bird delay you?" Lorlen looked up, frowned and shocked his head while trying to hide a smile. "Well it actually was a little girl with a pretty big bird. She bumped against me when I was turning a corner. She was injured and her shirt was ruined so I healed her and accompanied her home to ensure she wouldn't get into a jam because of me." Akkarin was now sitting in an armchair next to Lorlen, opening a bottle of Anuren Dark. "You, worried for what can happen to a woman? Who are you and what have you done with my friend?" Lorlen's eyebrows were unusually up and he was doing a smile of incredulity. Akkarin made a guffaw before answering. "She may be the most interesting woman I've seen in a long time. I guess she reminded me myself. It turned out that she likes adventures as much as I do or even more! You should have seen her face when I told her that I'm leaving tomorrow to see world." He was remembering the big blue shining eyes, it seemed as her eyes were filled with tiny stars. "Poor girl, I don't want to hear the lies you have told her!" Lorlen was laughing but with a disapproving gaze. "Look, she is probably going to enter the Guild in few years because I noticed a great magic potential inside her." And after a moment of silence he added "Take a look at her for me if I'm not back yet, would you?" Lorlen seemed amused. "Sure. But how old is she? What's her name?" Akkarin lingered and blinked quickly with a perplexity face before answering. "The truth is that I didn't ask her, my friend."

Both laughed and chatted about everything and nothing while they were drinking Anuren Dark until they said good-bye with a hug and the conviction that their friendship would be eternal.


	3. Chapter 2 - Discoveries

**A/N – Well folks, first of all thank you all for reading and reviewing! This chapter have been quite difficult to write and I was traveling for a week so it took more than I expected. I added Akkarin parts, mostly for having the hole plot and because his point of view is going to be very important, but if you think that they are not necessary, just say it please! :) Hope you like how the things are going to develop. All comments are welcomed. **

_Disclaimer – TBM world belongs to Trudi Canavan. I just try to do something enjoyable with it._

**CHAPTER 2 - DISCOVERIES**

Akkarin was full of expectation when he entered the Tombs of White Tears. He was harbouring the faith that he may find something important in that remote and frozen in time place. After the Drogon Scrolls "joke", he was not going to leave the Tombs without finding something interesting first. After all, if there was any place in the Allied Lands where he could find more information about that magic called Superior Magic, it was there. He found just few references to it in the oldest books of the Great Library of Capia. _It really seems that someone did great efforts to hide all evidence of that magic, I just hope that they didn't think in profaning tombs… _He was thinking in this when he entered the dark tunnel that leads to the oldest tombs.

When he reached the end, he started to find inscriptions in the walls, but there was so many stalactites and stalagmites that they formed an irregular ice wall which made impossible to look inside. Hoping that no one will notice it, Akkarin applied a little bit of concentrated heat in the thinnest part of the wall, creating a hole big enough to see the inner walls properly. He carefully examined the inscriptions inside before doing another hole to check the next tomb.

In many of them he found the same symbol, a hand with a growing moon over it, the symbol of the Superior Magic. It seemed that almost all the people buried in the oldest tombs practiced that type of magic when they were alive. But there was no clue of what that magic was or how to do it, though the fact that so many people practiced it made his suspicions grow. A magic, that was so common in older times, was now consigned to oblivion after a meticulous work of information destruction.

When Akkarin started his trip, his only hopes were being free and having adventures, but he had found someone that no one really expect that exist. Indeed, there was an unknown ancient magic. However, he should go to the oldest places if he wanted to discover something more about it, somewhere where those who tried to hide that magic had forgotten. Although there was a rising question in his head. _Why did they do it?_

* * *

It was already seven month since she had hit Akkarin, seven month in which every night she had tried to find her magic. First she tried to see it, looking inside of herself, then she tried to touch it with her inner skin. She even tried to heard or smell it, but nothing had worked. The night before she had tried to notice if something was moving inside of her besides her blood, but she could only heard the rhythm of her heart. She wasn't close neither to find a plan to convince her father to let her enter the Guild. One day she had asked if he could let a magician to make her the test, he simply said a cold no, without even stopping starring at the documentation that he was reading.

Lyria was starting to feel a little anxious and disappointed, but not that day. That day she woke up when the first sunray entered her room. She got out of the bed with a jump and started to get dressed. "Wake up Sky! You remember what day it is, don't you?" And she throw her nightgown to the blue bird that was sleeping over the clothes rack that was net to her bed. "Wake up! We are leaving."

She ran out the room and she went down stairs to the small room where she had breakfast every day. There was, like every year, a package wrapped with great delicacy, though that fact didn't seem to impress Lyria because she picked it up and began to tear the paper, pulling firmly and rapidly. Soon she could get what she was looking for, her new adventures book. _Great! Let's see what's about… _She thought this before dropping the broken package by one side on the table. Lyria was already reading the first lines when the packet impacted with the table with a much louder sound than the one that a simple paper would do. Lyria jumped and left her new book carefully aside to examine the package more closely.

Inside the paper she found a huge envelope and a piece of paper with a single statement. "I think that you are grown enough to read this." It was her father's handwriting and that made grow her curiosity even more. She opened the envelope and she found inside a letter and a silver pendant necklace. Lyria observed the necklace for a moment, it had a blue gem in the centre of a complex work of silver that formed a weird kind of flower or maybe flames. Then she left it next to the book and she took the letter. There were two papers written with big and elegant calligraphy. She gave a quick look to the first page and she froze when she saw the signature in the second one. It was a letter from her mother.

The only thing that Lyria knew about her mother was what the servants had told her. A very pretty woman, smart and elegant, with a strict sense of what was correct and what should be done. Her nanny had also told her that she had been her mother's personal servant and that she loved her very much despite the so short time that they'd had. Lyria knew that she had died just after she was born, Tiara's mother told her that she had a strange illness that had killed a lot of people on that time. Overall, no one had ever given her many details and she wasn't sure of willing to hear them. Generally, she didn't though often about her because every time she did she had to face a strange feeling of sadness, but, when she did, she imagined her happy and kind, just the opposite of her father.

She started to read the letter with a mixture of illusion and fear, her hands were trembling.

"_My dear Lyria,_

_I've decided to write you this letter to tell you what I would never have the chance to show you. First of all, I want you to know that I love you, since the first moment, with all my heart. The thing I regret the most about this illness is that it will impede me to see you growing. I hope that your father had accepted my inevitable death and that he loves you, I know that he will take good care of you. The necklace that I will keep with this letter had belonged to our family during many generations, now it belongs to you. This are the words that my mother told to me and that you must repeat to your daughter when the time comes. "There will be moments when you'll be afraid, it's normal, it's sensible and it is in these moments when you must be brave. Bring the Blue Gem and we all will be with you to give you strength and to guide you to the right path." Be brave, my darling, be strong and be happy above everything else. But do not base your happiness in yourself, because there is no great joy than the happiness of the ones you love. Work hard and do not slight anyone to reach your goals, this attitude is condemned to failure and loneliness. Be a good person, but trust only the ones who deserve it, do not expect too much of the others if you don't want to be disappointed. I know that these are poor advises for a whole life and I regret with all my heart not being able to help and teach you in the proper time. But when you feel alone, remember the Blue Gem and you'll find the strength to keep going. _

_I know you are going to do it well, make us be proud of you._

_I love you, now and forever. _

_Elia"_

When Lyria finished the letter, she stayed quiet like a statue for some seconds and then she reread it over and over again. At the end, she put the papers delicately inside the envelope again and she took the necklace with the Blue Gem to place it around her neck. She was surprised to notice that the metal wasn't cold, but comfortably warm. "Let's go Sky, we have to tell Tiara everything!" She took some rolls with butter with one hand and the envelope and the book with the other before leaving the room. Sky, whom had started to eat cookies when Lyria had finished to read the letter for the first time, took all the cookies that he could handle with his ducks and beak before follow her.

* * *

Lyria was back in the house at dinning time. She had spent a great day with Tiara. First she'd showed her friend the letter and the necklace and they had been talking for hours of how her mother had been and how could a gem give her any strength. In the afternoon, they had read the new book, which was pretty good and interesting. So she was in a really good mood when she left her room to have dinner with her father.

However, before she could reach the dining room, when she was in front the library, she heard a guttural voice that said "Lyria, come here." The library was dark but she could identify her father seating in the armchair and some wine bottles on the floor. "Have you read your mother letter?" His voice was now more similar to his usual one. "Yes, father." Lyria could smell the alcohol in the atmosphere, she didn't like it. Her father wasn't used to drink alcohol.

"What does she write? No, it doesn't matter." He said it all together, giving Lyria no time even to think the answer. "It shouldn't be letter, because she should be alive." His voice was now like a bottomless dark pit full of broken glasses. "But you took her away from me. You killed her! You stooled her life bit by bit until nothing left!" With the last word he broke the wine glass that he had on his hand and stood up. Lyria did a back step, scared.

"Father, I…" "Shut up! You even stole her eyes and now I have to remember it every time I see them!" In that moment he grabbed her by the arm, hand stained wine and blood, and he looked her deeply. It was the longer gaze he had ever given her. "Bring her back." He whispered. "You killed her, you should not be here. Bring her back, you killed her, you should not be here." He started to repeat it like a mantra, every time a little louder.

Lyria was petrified while she was thinking. _How can he blame me for mother's death? Everyone say that it was an illness. I didn't want her death. No, it is impossible that I killed her. But then, why is he telling that I killed her? _She tried to speak to her father, but he was shaking her and yelling over and over "Bring her back, you killed her, you should not be here!" His eyes still fixed on hers. Sky was flying around them, trying to bit Victor and screaming nonstop. Lyria was terrified, she could not even think and her cheeks began to wet with tears.

Then, with a particular hard shake, she notice her necklace against her nest and she remembered her mother words. She had read them some many times that day that she knew it by heart. _Be brave, be strong. _Then her fear was surpassed by her determination. She was going to be brave and also strong, she wouldn't let her father to blame her for something she hadn't done nor wanted. And then came the anger. Anger for eight years without a hug, a game or a look of approval. Anger for knowing that he didn't love her, rage at the longer look he had given her in her life, the only time he had touched her, it was to tell her _that_.

And, letting all the rage of her heart concentrate in her eyes, she stared back. But he seemed to be in a trance as he yelled and shook her and he didn't even notice the change in Lyria's attitude. At that point, Lyria felt degust for him and a huge desire of being as far from him, his eyes and his wine breathe as possible.

Suddenly, Victor flew to the other side of the library, the books fell of the shelves and the armchair began to burn. All was still and silent, for a moment. Then Lyria realized what she'd just done and fled without looking back.

She ran as fast as she can, without paying attention to where she was or where she was going until she tripped over a root. Her feet had brought her to the forest. And there she stayed, nestled between the roots of the giant white oak. She fell asleep with the burning armchair and her father's words echoing in her head.

* * *

When Akkarin reached the ruins of the ancient city of Armje, three months after visiting the White Tears Tombs, he was already absolutely sure that many years ago there was a kind of magic, called superior magic, that was practiced widely by magicians and that something had happened to them to make them stop and try to erase all traces of it. It was not much, but, considering the expectations with which he had begun his trip, discovering that it indeed existed an ancient magic, it was already a great achievement. He was proud of the discovery and he was happy to have seen all that he had seen. _This is the great adventure that I desired so much_. He thought with a smile in his lips. In that moment he saw again the bright eyes of the little girl, looking at him with admiration, and at that time he felt proud of himself.

He explored the ruins and discovered some well-kept rooms. He saw the symbol of Superior Magic in multiple sites. In one room there was a large rock that looked like a door, with inscriptions in an ancient Elyne language above it saying that the door leads to the Cavern of Ultimate Punishment, made to kill wizards. He knew that probably it wasn't wise going to investigate something that could kill him, but his curiosity was greater than his good sense. He withdrew the magic door and started down the passageway, the floor sloped slightly down and the air was cooling rapidly. The walls of the tunnel finished suddenly and a narrow ledge followed. Akkarin stood at the end of the tunnel, cautious for once, he had no intention of dying in that moment. He sent his light behind and increased its intensity. Falling on both sides of the cornice was considerable and the ledge widened to form a circular platform about ten steps ahead. He made the balloon light shine even more brightly and he gasped when the light was reflected in a flaming vault. The room's roof and walls glittered and sparkled as if covered countless gemstones. He observed them and he perceived that they were full of magic, not the kind of magic used to build by the Guild members, this was a more intense magic, more alive.

He hadn't a clue of how to do such a thing with gems, but he decided that he wasn't going to risk his life to discover it through that chamber, it must be some clue somewhere else. Besides, his curiosity had been dazzled by a myriad of precious and dangerous stones. He left the Cavern of Ultimate Punishment, he placed the stone again in its place and he decided to write a warning in the stone next to the inscriptions, just in case some magician came there not knowing ancient Elyne language.

Now that he had exhausted all the ideas he had about where to find explanations on Superior Magic on the Allied Lands, he only had one option left, he could only go to Sachaka.

**A/N - Well I hope that you liked it and that my english is good enough. Review please! :)**


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